"When do you suppose Amethyst will find my lady out?" said Kattern and
Tory, as they started for the primrose-picking the next day, and
Amethyst ran back again to beg her mother to drive round to the wood and
join them.
"Not yet," said Tory, "my lady is making up to her, as much as ever she
did to any man she ever went in for, and Amethyst would believe black
was white just at present."
"I'd like to see her face, if we told her what my lady is really like."
"You are not to tell her," said Una, suddenly turning round upon them,
"I won't have it. Let her be happy while she can; _I_ shall tell her,
when I think it proper."
Una looked languid and dull to-day. She did not care for gathering
primroses, and she was not strong enough to enjoy long out-door
expeditions. She watched Amethyst, with a look on her face, and
thoughts in her heart, which would much have astonished the elder girl
if she had noticed the one, or guessed at the other.
Amethyst good-naturedly patronised Kate and Gertie Leigh, girls matching
in age with Kattern and Tory; she made friends with their governess, who
had recently been the head girl at a rival school to Saint Etheldred's,
and was discussing the honours respectively gained by the two
institutions at all the recent examinations, with the heartiest
interest, when the party was enlarged by the arrival of Miss Riddell and
her nephew, and Mrs Leigh and her son. Lady Haredale, Major Fowler,
and some of the other guests at Cleverley also turned up. It was a day
of rare spring loveliness, blue sky, young green leaves, and springing
flowers.
"A day of beginnings," Sylvester Riddell said, as he noted the budding
oak trees, the unfolding blossoms, the opening intercourse that was
still in its first spring.
"You like the woods?" he said to Amethyst.
"Oh yes," she said, "I like everything here; you can't think how
pleasant beginning to be at home is."
"I suppose you are making several beginnings," he said.
"Yes," she answered, "I am beginning to know my sisters--and every one
here--and next week I am going to my first ball."
"Beginnings are very charming when they do not imply endings," said
Sylvester tritely; but he was thinking so much of the lovely slender
girl before him that he spoke half mechanically.
"That can never be," said Amethyst, with sudden gravity. "My
school-days are ended, and my living with my aunt. Beginnings must come
out of endings--but then they _are_ beginnings," she added; and
stooping, she picked a primrose, round which still lingered the large
faded leaves of last year, and showed it to him, with a grave smile on
her soft young lips.
Sylvester never forgot her as she stood there, dressed all in mossy
green that harmonised with the woods. He had a dim sense that a
beginning was coming to him, as he took the fresh primrose and the faded
leaf out of her hand.
"One ought to be able to spin a poem out of this," he said; but just
then Lucian Leigh came springing down the bank, a picturesque figure in
his brown suit, and looking, as the little girls climbed and scrambled
after him, as like a young wood god, as Amethyst was like a wood nymph.
"They matched exactly," Sylvester thought, as they drew by instinct
together, and through all the merry afternoon, seemed the motive of the
picture, the centre of the piece.
"It is quite charming to be so rustic," said Lady Haredale; while Tory
and Kattern forgot about being charming as they scrambled about with
their contemporaries, and Amethyst drank in happiness with the sun and
the air. To-day was indeed a delightful beginning.
It began a great deal. Lady Haredale was a person who liked something
to be always going on, and hardly a day passed without some little
scheme of pleasure, some opportunity for meetings something that gave
colour and brightness to the days. Distant neighbours seemed to come
nearer, and Cleverley had never been so gay within the memory of man.
Yet it all seemed quite simple. Lady Haredale, the Cleverley ladies
said, liked simple pleasures, and freely owned that she must have
inexpensive ones. There was the county ball for a climax, and various
set entertainments given at the country houses round for salient points;
but Lady Haredale did little but keep open house in a sort of free and
easy way. Lord Haredale was a good deal absent in London, and Major
Fowler, so old a family friend, acted as a sort of deputy master of the
house, showed the young men the way to the sideboard, set games of
billiards on foot, took a hand at whist in the evenings. Sometimes,
when there were young people, they all played round games, and put three
penny bits into the pool. It could not be true, that whisper of Lady
Haredale playing for high stakes and losing money, or she could not have
laughed so merrily over the threepenny "vingt-un with variations."
Then, when the wind was cold after playing tennis, for which the season
was still early, she made such pretty fun over producing champagne and
claret cup at afternoon tea, that, though such was not the Cleverley
custom except at large garden-parties, there seemed nothing to wonder
at;--though it was a pity that so young a girl as Una Haredale should be
allowed to drink it.
Lady Haredale did not dress too youthfully, or try to keep her beautiful
daughter in the background; on the contrary, everything was arranged to
make a good time for Amethyst; Lady Haredale chose her dresses with the
utmost care, and taught her how to arrange them becomingly, with so
outspoken a delight in the girl's beauty as almost rendered her flattery
harmless. Those were happy weeks. Now and then came little shocks and
startling incidents; but they fell on unheeding ears.
A very few words are enough to tell Amethyst's story. She and Lucian
Leigh fell in love with each other; suddenly, rapturously, without delay
or misgiving, almost at the first sight of each other's fair faces,
almost with the first sense of an answering stir in each other's souls,
Lucian courted her in a quiet but most unmistakable fashion; and soon,
life for Amethyst meant his presence, his words and looks. She was
carried off her feet, caught out of herself. Even as she knew "what
made the assembly shine" for her, she was well assured that she "made
the ball fine" for him. She did not remain unconscious or ignorant of
what had befallen her. Love did not come to her with slow, cautious,
and imperceptible footsteps, he caught her in a sweet frenzy, which left
no space for misgivings; while her quickly answering warmth probably
hastened and intensified the passion, which might have seemed alien to
Lucian's slower and shyer nature.
A few social meetings and games of tennis together--one or two
encounters "by chance," which yet were so important that it seemed as if
the whole course of life must have been arranged to bring them about--a
sunny Sunday or two, in the same church, singing the same hymns--a
belief in each other's goodness, so that no misgivings troubled their
joy in each other's charms, scraps of talk--wonderful glances--the
county ball, where Amethyst's success woke Lucian to the sudden fear of
rivalry, and where the world began to say that she was a great beauty--a
dance the next night at a neighbour's house--a long, long waltz
together, then, dim lights, heavy-scented flowers, a wonderful sense of
being alone, after the crowd of dancers; then feelings found words,
words hardly needed, his arms were round her, his kiss on her lips, and,
after scarcely a doubt or a fear, in three short weeks, in a dozen
meetings, Amethyst's heart was won, her promise given, and all her
story, as she believed, told.
But, with the actual promise given, with the spoken words, Lucian, at
any rate, woke up to a sense of real life, and of what it behoved him to
do.
"To-morrow I must come to Lord Haredale. I hope he won't kick me
down-stairs."
"Why should he be angry? We are not doing wrong.--That is--ought I to
have told mother first?--Was it too quick?" faltered Amethyst, crimson
and trembling with sudden misgiving.
"Too quick! It has seemed a life-time since last night, before I could
speak to you! I am my own master. But you, who might have all London
at your feet, they will say I ought to have let you have a season in
town first."
"But that wouldn't have made any difference."
"No? I don't suppose it would. Nothing could make any difference to
me. We'll go and live at Toppings. You like the country. I meant to
see if I could not go to Norway, and get some seal fishing; but I shan't
care for that now, we'll settle down at once."
But this was going too fast for Amethyst.
"Oh don't," she said, "don't; I--I cannot think.--It is too much.--I
want to stop--to wait--not to have any more now!"
She turned white as she spoke, overwhelmed with the rush of emotion;
while Lucian, though only half-comprehending, held himself back, drew
her on to a seat, and said, "I've done something clumsy, and frightened
you. I always do."
"Oh no--no--no! But oh! It is so wonderful--it is--it is like death!"
cried Amethyst. She did not in the least know what she meant, and in a
moment the strange rapture passed, the colour came back in natural
blushes, her eyes fell, and she rose from her seat.
"Some one will come. Let us go back. Let us find mother."
Lucian laughed a little curious laugh, and as the music ceased, and
footsteps sounded, he offered her his arm formally, and led her back
into the lighted ball-room; where, at the entrance to the conservatory,
her partner claimed her, and he began to remember that there was a young
lady somewhere to whom he had been introduced.
A boyish shyness seized on him, he turned his back on Amethyst, and went
off hastily to the other end of the room. And she, away from him,
suddenly found out that she was utterly, wonderfully happy, and laughed
and danced with joyous glee. She did not want to speak to him or to
come near him again just yet, she only wanted to feel happy, in the
whirl of the music and the dancing, and the sparkle of the lights.
While he stood in a corner, and thought how lovely she looked.
There were other people in the carriage with Amethyst and her mother as
they drove home; but as soon as they arrived there, and the
"Good-nights" had passed, she pursued Lady Haredale to the cosy
dressing-room, where she sat up late sometimes with a novel, or dawdled
over one in the morning, when disinclined to come down-stairs. She had
taken off her evening dress, and was sitting by the fire in a pretty
blue dressing-gown, which gave her an unusually youthful look, when
Amethyst, still in her white ball dress, came in and stood by her side.
"Well, little girl, what is it?"
"Oh, mamma," said Amethyst, "mamma; I thought I ought to come." She
stammered a little, then lifted up her stately head, and said simply,
"Lucian Leigh has asked me to marry him."
"Already?" exclaimed Lady Haredale. "Why I shall never make a
match-making mother. I saw that he was _epris_, but I never thought of
its happening at once!"
"I--I am afraid it seems quick--but, mother--I hope you won't be angry,
nor my father--but I said yes."
"You did? and suppose my lord says no?"
"Oh, mamma, he will not?"
"Suppose he does?"
"I should wait till he consented, I couldn't change. But indeed, mamma,
he has _quite_ enough money."
"The little mercenary thing! She has thought of that!"
"No--no--but I thought there could be nothing else, he is so good."
"Now look here, Amethyst," said Lady Haredale, standing up, and laying
her hand on the girl's shoulder, "this is your first fancy?"
"Mother!"
"Well, yes, I supposed so. Now listen, and no one shall say I don't
tell you all the truth. You are a beauty. That is a very different
thing from being a pretty girl. You would have--I could ensure your
having--a great success, and you might make a very great marriage. I
don't think many mothers would let you marry in the country at eighteen.
But, on the other hand, we're as poor as rats, as you know; if you
marry young Leigh you are provided for, and if you think you love him--I
believe she _is_ in love with him--all my children are susceptible! No,
I won't talk you out of it."
"Talking could not make any difference," said Amethyst; then
suddenly--"Oh, mamma, I don't want to be wilful, I will try to be good,
but please--please don't say I must not!"
There was a passion in her tone, which Lady Haredale felt.
"No," she said. "You _shall_ have him! How like you are to poor pretty
Blanche; you shan't be talked out of your lover as she was. I'll not
have it on my conscience. But does the child think she knows her own
mind?"
Amethyst felt indescribably jarred and hurt by her mothers manner. Her
cheeks burnt and her eyes were bright, as she answered with equal
straightforwardness, and with unexpected passion--
"I should have liked to be a beauty, and have a success; I know I should
like it. But that's all nothing, compared--compared to _him_," as the
tears came in floods, and she hid her face.
"Ah!" said Lady Haredale.--"Poor little girl, it's a shame to tease her!
You are a good child, my pretty Amethyst, and you shall stay good, if
you can. Come, kiss me and forgive me, and you shall have your way."
Amethyst threw herself into her mother's arms, and, in clinging kisses,
soon forgot her vexation. "Mother was right to make sure;" and she only
felt that she had the kindest and tenderest mother ever known, and the
most sympathetic. For Lady Haredale, with a sudden change of tone,
began to question her, and listened to the little idyll with as fresh
and eager an interest as if she had been Amethyst's sister or school
friend.
"My darling, its lovely. It's the sweetest thing I ever knew, and I
won't let anything interfere with it."